Tips for Top Talks
Giving an oral presentation to one’s peers can be a daunting experience, particularly for first timers. However, if all goes well, it can also be an experience that is deeply rewarding and empowering. Although only a few of those theatrical-type extroverts are blessed with natural oral skills on the stage, there are many things one can do to enhance, improve and evolve one’s oral performance. Professionally speaking, oral communication skills of a high order are extremely sought after in the workplace. So it is a good idea to take every opportunity possible to practise and hone your presentation skills. Providing you have something interesting to say, always try to be one of the presenters at a conference. Even if you think you may have nothing to say yet in terms of your research progress, it is quite acceptable (at AMSA anyway) for students who are still only in the planning or very early stages of their research to give a talk. This can be an excellent vehicle for improving upon, or getting support for, your research plans, methodology etc. - or for putting you in touch with useful references or contacts (i.e. networking!!).
Your audience is extremely important and the main reason you are giving your talk. You are conveying to them valuable scientific (and other) information. They must leave your talk having gotten something from it - even if it is just an improved understanding of your particular research area, or the opportunity to give something back to you (e.g. advice, a reference, a contact, etc.). Of course it would be nice if they also learned something about you in the process (i.e. it’s always good to let some personality come through!). You must treat your audience with respect and consideration, both in the preparation of your talk and in its delivery. In a way, you are there to serve them - you are serving up good communication with some knowledge to go!
Basically, there are two key elements to giving a successful oral presentation; success being measured by the fact that the talk (and you) went well, and that the audience received your intended message. These key elements are: (1) Be Prepared, and (2) Serve Your Audience. Some tips and methods for achieving these elements are described in more detail below.
1) Preparation, Preparation, Preparation - Be prepared!!
Composing the Talk - In general, oral presentations should be composed in three main parts: an introduction; the main body; and a conclusion. In terms of the usual time allocation [i.e. 15 mins talk + 5 mins questions], allow about 2-3 minutes for the introduction, 10 minutes for the main body, and 2-3 minutes for the conclusion - and of course allow 5 minutes for questions from the audience.
The Introduction section is designed to set up and introduce your talk (ie. not the whole field of science that your topic falls within). Beginning with a greeting is always nice - but not compulsory. Your next words need to convey the topic of your presentation - here is also a good point to introduce specific requests of the audience or state what your talk might give them, for example: "Today I'm talking about the effects of global climate change on the rhubarb fish, ....and I would really appreciate your advice and comments regarding the particular methodology I've chosen"; or, ....and I'm having a problem with literature so if anyone could suggest some relevant articles, that would be really helpful"; or, ....and as I hope you will see from this talk, there are important ramifications for your daily lives in terms of how much rhubarb fish you may be able to consume in the future.", etc. In essence, the Introduction should outline what you intend to talk about in the next 10 minutes or so, including the key features of the talk, and the structure of the talk.
The Main Body of the talk is where you provide the content of your talk, and your main messages to the audience. It's often said that people generally will walk away with only three or so key messages from a presentation. Therefore it is wise before writing your talk to try and articulate those messages to yourself and thereby define in your own mind the objectives of your talk. Of course you should also stay mindful of also presenting enough information such that the science remains credible. For example, the objective of your research or the hypothesis/es you are testing must be clearly stated up-front; also, methodological, research and analytical procedures need to be outlined (albeit briefly), particularly if they represent a novel approach. Present your results clearly and explain what they mean - put them in context such that the audience can understand them (ie. even if audience members are of different disciplines). Discuss implications and linkages; compare your work to other relevant work.
The Conclusion of the talk is where you sum-up and recap. Provide the audience with the main points or findings (generally presented in a similar order to the main body). This is also the place to put your work into some sort of big-picture context. For example, has your work suggested future directions for research or has it suggested linkages with the research of other projects or disciplines. Again it may be pertinent to remind the audience if you want something of them, like feedback, references, contacts, etc. Close your talk with the appropriate thank-you sentiment.
Now you have written your talk, you may need to prune it (this will become obvious when you discover you have 52 overheads, or the talk goes for 40 minutes when you practice it). Pruning of the talk can be done by first categorising the various pieces of information that make up your talk and then eliminating some of them. There are only three categories of information: viz. the audience ......1) Must know (ie. essential material), 2) Should know (ie. useful but not essential), and 3) Could know (ie. nice but not necessary)......in order for them to understand my talk. All the 'Could knows' can go straight away - don't hesitate! Many of the 'Should knows' can also go - be ruthless, particularly if length/time is proving a problem. Of course, the 'Must knows' must never go!
Through rewriting and rehearsal you will eventually get the length, structure and content of your talk just right. Don't be surprised if you go through several versions/drafts before the final one is reached. Remember however, the more experienced you become at writing and presenting talks, the less effort will be required at the stage of composition.
Visual Aids - Along with crafting the text of your talk, you will also need to plan and craft the design and content of your visual display material. For the types of oral presentations in the conference setting, it is generally best to rely heavily on visual aids. In terms of audience recall a few days later, people generally only recall about 10 to 20% of what they have heard, but they recall 30% of what they have seen, and this leaps to 50-70% for what they have both heard and seen. Therefore the appropriate and effective use of visual aids can dramatically increase the power of recall. This is partly because visual aids gain attention and help arouse and maintain interest. They also help to simplify the information you are portraying by illustrating, clarifying, summarising, or emphasising points.
For visually displayed text, bullet points with key words or concise sentences are best. As a guide, generally no more than 6 lines of text to the 'page' and 6 words or less in a line works well for PowerPoint or OverHead 'pages'. Remember - the displayed text should not require onerous reading by the audience and it should also be intended as a memory-jogger for you to expand on while you talk. If you have lots of data, try to think of ways to conceptualise and summarise it with some form of graph or diagram. Steer away from complex tables, as these are generally difficult for the audience to read and interpret. If you are showing graphs, it helps to quickly explain the axes and scale if appropriate. It is also useful to keep your visual material as simple and uncluttered as possible - and take care not to use too many colours, bells and whistles, or transition effects when developing a PowerPoint presentation.
Which Medium? - These days PowerPoint presentations are very popular and they look very professional - however they do present a high-risk option that is very technology dependent. All sorts of things can go wrong and they often do - from having ones laptop (plus talk) pinched (as happened at the Sydney conference last year) to having the presentation crash half way through due to memory and other technological hiccups. I believe the wisest course of action is to be prepared and hedge your bets. Always take your presentation on a couple of different media - for example: PowerPoint (laptop/2 discs kept in different places) and Overheads; or Slides and Overheads; or PowerPoint and Slides. That way you always have a back-up - although if the power fails you are still in deep sh..! Also, a nice feature of PowerPoint presentations is that you can easily print out your talk on 2 or 3 pages - so you could have a small stack available at your talk for interested people to take away with them.
Equipment - Being prepared also means familiarising yourself with the room in which, and the equipment with which, you will give the talk. Know where you will stand. Know what you will use to point with (eg. long stick, pen, laser device). Know where you will put your notes, etc. Know if and where there is a glass of water (for when the saliva drys up!). Know how big the room is - this will affect the degree to which you may have to project your voice. Know if you need a microphone, and where to put it/how to use it. Know how to operate the lights, computer, other audiovisual control panel aspects as appropriate. Preload your slides or PowerPoint presentation and make sure they come up OK on the screen that is being used. Cue it/them. Similarly, if you are using the overhead projector - know how to operate it and put a couple of your OHs on the machine to make sure it is aligned correctly for the screen and that it is legible and in-focus for the audience. Understanding and being familiar with the environment and equipment when giving a talk goes a long way to boosting ones self confidence during the process. If you do all this, and things still stuff up - then you can blame someone else!!
Also, it is also useful to have your notes at hand - even if just for comfort. But please, do not be tempted to read them verbatim - your visual aids are your main prompt. It is best to have your notes on several large cards rather than on paper - as paper rustles and can be quite noisy, especially if you are using a microphone.
Rehearse and Refine - This one is a must - particularly in the early days of ones oral presentation career. To gain a thorough knowledge of your material and equipment there is nothing like the dry-run. This can be done either with or without an audience - although it is always best to have someone out there listening and giving you feedback. Who will tell you that you um and ah; or that they can't read your overheads; or that you are talking too fast, soft, slow; or that you are seemingly having a romantic rendezvous with the pointer? - if you don't have someone out there listening to your rehearsal. (It's best to make it a trusted friend or colleague initially.) An essential component of the rehearsal is to get an accurate diagnosis of the time your presentation is taking. Often using equipment and other various pauses take up time and are not accounted for when you are just reading your talk to yourself and timing it. Rehearsing will tell you which aspects of your content and style need adjusting. You can then refine your talk accordingly and rehearse again until you are feeling comfortable and confident - and your practice-audience gives you a good rating!
Rehearsing can also help you deal with question time. Get your friend to ask you a few contrived but unknown-to-you questions - just to practice and get the feel of answering on-the-spot. If you are asked a real curly one at the end of your conference presentation, a good way out is to say something like "that's a really good question/aspect/issue, I'm afraid it might take too long to go into detail about it here, but perhaps we could talk more about it later, if that's OK with you?"
2) Serve Your Audience - The Delivery!!
Engage your audience - Be mindful of displaying positive body language when delivering your talk. Try and face your audience most of the time. Although not strictly necessary, if possible, and you are comfortable, come out from behind the desk or lectern, as these objects place a barrier between you and your audience. However, of vital importance is eye contact with your audience - make sure it is frequent and evenly distributed. The fastest way to turn an audience off is to look at the ceiling for the whole talk (or the floor, your notes, the screen, etc.). Even if you are a tad shy - just think of them all sitting out there with no clothes on or something (or if you where specs, don't, and you can't see them properly anyway!). Remember - only you know your topic as well as you do - and, mostly, your audience is on your side, as they have to take the stage at times too!
Avoid Distracting behaviour - Invariably everybody does this to some degree, however the various forms of distracting behaviour can incur various degrees of off-puttedness to the audience (even if they are going out in sympathy with you!). Examples include: tapping the foot; rocking on your feet from side to side; playing with your hair (especially the strangle-hold for those with long hair); brushing against your microphone (if wearing a lapel type); playing with something you are holding (like a pen for pointing), etc. But perhaps one of the classic styles is, the old lean the whole body against the long wooden pointer type behaviour (a real temptation in those old lecture theatres at university venues). Another trap can be to use your finger as a pointer for OverHead projectors - beware the tremor is magnified a hundred fold! Being mindful of these types of behaviours is the first step to avoiding them. Although, granted, most of us when speaking in public do tend to go into some form of transcendental sub-conscious pilot mode - so I'm sure everyone appreciates it is difficult to be entirely conscious of and responsible for ones bodily behaviour/s!
Voice - This is very important. As you are talking (der!), the audience must be able to hear you, so unless you have a loud voice - speak up or use a microphone (note that most people tend to go for a mic. these days). Speak clearly. Be careful not to make repetitive sounds like umms and ahhs etc. This may actually require some practice for some people. Also, it's often difficult to know if you are doing it or not, so ask a trusted friend or colleague to give you some feedback. The speed of your delivery is also important. Your talk is limited by time, however don't rush it or people won't understand what you are saying or won't be able to keep up. Conversely, don't dawdle or have great pauses (that will just annoy people). The tone of your delivery is also important - try not to be monotonal about it (as that is dry and boring to listen to), but also don't overinflect every sentence either as that can also be monotonous. Try to make it lively and interesting - this often stems from your own interest and enthusiasm. Humour always helps - but in these sorts of talks it is usually the unplanned, spontaneous type of humour that goes down the best.
Time Management - Your presentation will be limited by an extremely important factor - time. At most conferences, including AMSA, talks are usually allocated 15 minutes for your presentation plus 5 minutes for questions. It is extremely rude (and a big no no) to have your talk go for the full 20 minutes or more. The conference agenda is generally jam packed - and if one speaker goes over-time it creates a chain-reaction for the whole day (and may even impinge on peoples' leisure and networking time, like lunch or afternoon tea!). Also, if you leave no time for questions you are denying your audience the opportunity for a two-way exchange with you (and you may then risk leaving an impression, albeit subconscious, that you spoke at them, not with them). Generally it is the role of the Session Chair to monitor the time and warn the speaker accordingly. This should be sorted out by you with the Chair prior to your session (for example, often there is a warning of 2 minutes or so prior to question time). Please never ignore the warning signals of the Chair. If you do find yourself in the unfortunate position of going overtime, appologise and skip to your conclusion, and wrap up ASAP. You'll be pleased to hear, however, that it is usually the students that are the best at sticking to the timing aspect of presenting at conferences.
In Conclusion - Just prior to your talk, have a big drink of water, finalise your ablutions, take five deep breaths, and BREAK A LEG!